The Spirit and the Flesh by Boyd Douglas

Author:Boyd, Douglas [Boyd, Douglas]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Endeavour Press
Published: 2017-06-07T22:00:00+00:00

Part IV

Chapter I

In the vineyards and the small ploughed fields of the narrow valleys that led down to the plain of the Dordogne, the heads of early-rising farmworkers turned to watch the unusual spectacle of an elderly man with crew-cut hair, clad in track suit and trainers, running hard through the clinging early morning ground mist. He was accompanied by an athletic-looking young man whose blond hair and blue eyes marked him as a foreigner from the other side of the Rhine. As the runners passed, greetings were called in the patois: Holá! or Adéou!

Hermann Kreuz did not hear them; his entire attention was turned inward on the functioning of his body. With each step the iron-willed septuagenarian monitored his heart-beat, lung capacity and the performance of his muscles as he did each morning on the exercise track which followed the perimeter of the Valle de los Cantos. Alongside him, a blond bodyguard kept pace silently, running with the spring of youth in his step and a film of sweat on his naked chest.

Back at the hotel in St Denis, Kreuz handed his muddy outer clothes and shoes to the bodyguard. Naked except for a pair of brief shorts, he made himself comfortable among the puddles on the riverside terrace for the rest of his morning work out to the surprise of the other residents eating their breakfast in the restaurant of Chez Dominique. Kreuz ignored their curious stares. One hundred press-ups were followed by a punishing schedule of pull-ups, knee bends, then twisting and bending exercises on the wet tiles. He returned to his room where his personal masseuse gave him a vigorous full-body massage. After a cold shower, Kreuz ate his usual breakfast of dried fruit and nuts.

*

Merlin was waiting for the kettle to boil when he heard the peremptory knocking on the kitchen door.

‘Who’s there?’ he called in English and repeated: ‘Qui y a-t-il?’ He opened the door slightly and peered round the edge to see, standing outside in the light drizzle, a visitor in a blue flannel blazer over a white polo neck sweater and grey worsted trousers. With his air of well-groomed health and self assurance, Hermann Kreuz would have looked more in place on the deck of a yacht in Cannes harbour than standing in the muddy driveway of a Dordogne cottage.

Taking him for one of Jay’s neighbours, Merlin asked, ‘Puis je vous aider?’

‘You are Freeman?’ The question was in English.

‘That’s right.’ Merlin felt an instant dislike for the man on the doorstep.

‘I may come in, out of the rain?’ Taking the answer for granted, Kreuz stepped inside. He viewed the untidy kitchen with distaste and brought his gaze back approvingly to Merlin’s well-muscled body, naked except for a pair of under-shorts.

‘Kreuz!’ He extended a hand which crushed Merlin’s in a grip of steel.

‘Freut mich sehr, Herr Kreuz.’ Merlin winced at the unnecessary pressure.

The German smiled thinly. ‘Herr Doktor Kreuz.’

‘Doctor as in medicine?’ Merlin poured hot water onto the coffee in the filter.

‘I am an art historian, Mr Freeman.

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